Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Once a Hog, always a Hog in track
FAYETTEVILLE — Of the 11 qualified with University of Arkansas, Fayetteville ties, only one will officially compete actively as a Razorback at the World Outdoor Track and Field Championships.
Kemar Mowatt, the reigning SEC Men’s Outdoor 400-meter hurdles champion from Jamaica, will hurdle for his homeland Aug. 5-13 at the World Championships in London after last week placing second at Jamaica’s national meet. He then will return to the Razorbacks as a 2018 senior.
The 10 others bound for London have left the Razorbacks in their rear-view mirror.
But to Razorbacks men’s Coach Chris Bucknam, USA long jump champion and 400-relay qualifier Jarrion Lawson, USA runner-up Andrew Irwin and USA runner-up Stanley Kebenei, former Razorbacks qualified at last week’s USA Outdoor Championships in Sacramento, Calif. to represent the U.S. in London, and UA Jamaican grads, Omar McLeod, Clive Pullen and Kemoy Campbell, champions at Jamaica’s national meet last week in Kingston, compete no less Arkansas actively than Mowatt.
Ditto Arkansas women’s Coach Lance Harter speaking about former Razorbacks Sandi Morris, the 2016 Olympic silver medalist and last week’s USA national women’s pole vault champion, and USA 1,600-relay qualifier Daina Harper and former Razorbacks Dominique Scott (5,000 meters) and Sparkle McKnight (400 meters) qualified for their respective South Africa and Trinidad national teams.
In recruiting, Bucknam and Harter say, there is no Arkansas past tense at the Olympic Games or World Championships.
“Any time they announce your name over the PA, it triggers Arkansas,” Harter said. “So on TV and at the meet, it’s Arkansas, Arkansas. We get contacted all the time after those events by people interested in Arkansas. Especially the pole vault with Bryan.”
Bryan Compton, the Razorbacks women’s vault coach, still coaches Morris and has coached Olympians Tina Sutej and recent TV Ninja star April Steiner. He actively coaches Razorbacks 2016 Olympian Lexi Weeks, Tori Weeks and Desiree Freier, all 2017 Indoor and Outdoor All-Americans.
Twin sisters Tori and Lexi swapped first and second at the SEC Indoor for first and second at the SEC Outdoor.
“Bryan gets barraged with people wanting to come and be a pole vaulter,” Harter said. “They think if he puts his hand on their forehead and they drink the water locally, that they’re going to jump 15 feet.”
Since they haven’t yet signed pro contracts after graduating in the spring, Harper in Sacramento and Pullen in Kingston wore Arkansas jerseys, as did Mowatt.
So did McLeod as a 2015 NCAA record-setting senior winning at Jamaica’s national meet.
“It helps in recruiting,” Bucknam said.
Bucknam won’t have to remind recruits that Lawson as a Razorbacks senior won the 2016 Bowerman Award, the college track and field equivalent to football’s Heisman after becoming the first since the legendary Jesse Owens in 1936 to win the long jump, 100 and 200 at the same NCAA Outdoor meet.
Sportscasters in London will do that for him worldwide.